Secret Santa-ing
by Loads of Randomness
Summary: An expansion of chapters 2 and 18 of 'The Meaning of Christmas'. Based off Atojiso's December 2017 2nd and 18th Writing Prompts: #Gifstery and #Reveal where Tony doesn't know why he wants to hide small gifts everywhere for his definitely not a Christian partner but does it anyway because it really frustrates her and that's funny. He just needs to avoid her catching him. Easy, right
1. Gifstery

Grumbling, Ziva placed her bag under her desk and sat down, peeling off hat, scarf, gloves and other winter accoutrements. The weather outside was absolutely _freezing_ and she did not like it. She did not like the cold. She did not like the damp that hung around. And she definitely did not like the way her breath hung in front of her in little clouds. These things do not happen in the desert. She much preferred the desert. She grumbled a bit more, shuffling her bag and placing her gun in the appropriate drawer. Another thing to dislike. Why could she not have it on her person or at least on her desk she would never know. Americans were woefully unprepared for threats or had too much faith in their security. Either way, Gibbs had made it clear to her that when in the office her gun went in a drawer. Whatever. She huffed again and finally made motions to start her day.

Reaching over to turn her computer on, she froze - finger never hitting the power button. There was something on her desk, right in front of her keyboard. Her eyes narrowed, how had she not seen it before? She blamed the cold.

Ziva looked at the item on her desk in confusion and with more than a little suspicion. It was a small box wrapped in shiny blue paper. Quite an attractive shade of blue too. It did not alleviate her suspicion at all. The eye-catching things were always the most dangerous. There was usually a reason for them to need to draw you in and it was never a good reason in Ziva's vast experience.

She looked around her, no one was watching. Or even here, which was odd. Usually McGee would be here, typing away. She wasn't early today thanks to the stupid weather. But McGee wasn't here, Gibbs was probably around somewhere, waiting to pounce out at the littlest of infractions and Tony was probably late. She leaned a bit closer to the box, nose almost touching it. Was it safe?

Doubling checking to ensure no one was watching her decidedly odd behaviour, Ziva poked it. Nothing. No ticking, no explosions, no strange clicks. Nothing. Just a box. A gift even, she supposed. But who would be getting her a gift? Her birthday had passed and she didn't celebrate Christmas. She was also not a child so did not do any gift exchange for Hanukkah; it was a bit early for it anyway. So, what was it doing on her desk? It was hers; her name was on it - written in blocky handwriting she didn't recognise. An obvious ploy to hide the sender's identity. Every sensible instinct was screaming at her not to open it, that it was a trap of some sort. Or even a joke.

But there was no one around to witness what might happen if she opened it... She could always hide any remnants of it before anyone appeared if something embarrassing happened.

Giving the box one last poke, Ziva decided to give into her curiosity and opened it. Sliding her knife neatly under the edges of the paper, it fell away in one piece. She smoothed it out and folded it up to save. It was very pretty paper. She then turned to her gift.

It was a box of chocolates. Her _favourite_ chocolates. The ones that melted in your mouth and made you keep eating them, you couldn't just have one. _Those_ ones. Hmm, interesting. Not many people knew of her love of these and certainly none of them were in this country. She opened the box slowly, still half expecting it to explode, and unwrapped one. It _looked_ like the real deal. She popped it in her mouth and chewed slowly.

_Oh_. Her eyes widened at the taste filling her mouth. It was the real deal.

She frowned at the box. Odd.

* * *

It happened again the next day. But not at her desk. She was returning from a good spar at the gym (the poor guy was still probably whimpering on the mat) when it fell out of her locker. This time it was an odd, lumpy shape but still in the same pretty paper. She walked out of the locker room, looking at it with a puzzled expression.

"What's that?" Tony asked, also leaving the gym and rubbing a towel over his still damp hair.

"A gift," she responded, not looking up at him as she inquisitively felt the gift all over - trying to figure out what it might be.

Tony walked up behind her to peer at it from over her shoulder.

"From who?"

Did he always have to be so nosy?

She gave him a warning loom before responding, "I do not know."

"It doesn't have a name?"

"If it did, I would know would I not?"

Her tone didn't seem to be too off-putting to him. She took a deep breath, he was not the cause of her confusion, he did not deserve to be snapped at.

"Oh," Tony waggled his eyebrows at her. "A secret admirer."

He did, however, deserve her elbow in his gut.

* * *

This was officially driving her crazy. It was now the end of the week and she had found another three. One each day. They were all wrapped in the same paper (that she had saved much to Tony's amusement) and were always something small but something she enjoyed. Today's was a voucher to the smoothie place she loved tucked into her coat pocket. It was enough for two smoothies, which was surprising. One would have been enough for a gift in her mind. Two seemed to be a bit extravagant. When it had happened, she didn't know. It had definitely not been there this morning.

She was no closer to figuring out who was responsible for them as she was at the start of the week. They had left no trace of themselves and even the cameras McGee had set up had revealed nothing. The person must know where they were but who had such a skill as well as know what she liked?

"What you doin'?"

Ziva jumped and swung around, fist raised.

"Woah!" Her partner jumped back from her.

"_Tony_," she hissed, eyes narrowed.

His arms were in the air in a defensive position and a terrified expression was on his face.

"What the hell, Ziva?" he demanded.

"You were sneaking behind me!"

She refused to be apologetic over her reaction. He _knew_ how she reacted to people creeping behind her.

"Actually, I walked."

"You know better than to come from behind me," she dismissed.

Tony rolled his eyes at her but nodded as well.

"I suppose I should be glad that you didn't stab me," he said in a dramatic tone.

Now it was Ziva's turn to roll her eyes as she turned back to a far more pressing matter. It wasn't like she was going to stab him out in the open, what did he take her for? The first rule of assassination was _no witnesses_.

"So, what exactly are you doing?" Tony repeated.

Ziva sighed. Should she really tell him anything? If she didn't, he wouldn't leave her alone but if she did, he also wouldn't leave her alone.

Deciding that telling him would probably involve less whining, she answered, "I am staking out something."

She felt him move beside her, she wasn't taking her eyes from her desk. He tilted his head to one side, a puzzled look on his face as he pointedly looked around her.

"Your desk?"

"Yes."

"_Why_?"

"To figure out who is leaving things for me."


	2. Why?

"I'm just saying that I don't think you understand the meaning of a 'secret admirer'," Tony informed his partner, shaking his head.

Tony understood the feeling of wanting to figure out who a person was, especially when they were leaving gifts all over the place but he thought his partner was being a _little_ ridiculous. Though, roping in McGee was a stroke of genius even if the little cameras were overkill. Why McGee even had those in the first place was something to investigate and probably tease about at a later point. Preferably when he wasn't distracted by trying to keep one step ahead of his partner. He needed something to occupy days of no cases.

"The person is not leaving romantic messages so how is it a 'secret admirer'?" Ziva asked.

Tony opened his mouth to answer and almost immediately closed it again. How on earth was he meant to answer that without incriminating himself? If he pointed out that usually anonymous gifts implied romantic interest that meant that _he_ was Ziva's secret admirer. Which he was. Or, he was but more in the friend kind of way not romantic kind of way. Right? He shook his head, getting a weird look from his partner.

He scratched the back of his head. "It's just the kind of this a secret admirer would do," he offered weakly.

Ziva gave him a long look, making him feel nervous, before shrugging.

"No matter who they-"

"Don't you mean he?" Tony interrupted.

"The person has given no indication if they are male or female," Ziva told him dismissively. "I did not want to make assumptions."

Tony gave his partner an appraising look. She seemed remarkably unconcerned that a woman might be crushing on her. Hmm, interesting. Another thing to investigate at a later date.

"Well, no matter who _they_," she gave him a pointed look, "are or what their intentions are, I would still like to know _who_ they are."

"But how come? What if they don't want to be discovered? That's kind of the point of anonymous gifts," Tony pointed out.

"I would like to know why," Ziva replied simply.

"Why?" Tony repeated.

She shrugged at him, seemingly uncaring but Tony knew her better.

"Why me?" she answered. "Why now?"

"It _is_ the season for gift-giving."

Ziva looked unimpressed by that. "But I am Jewish. I do not celebrate Christmas."

"Not even for Hanukkah?" Tony teased with a grin.

Gift giving happened at Hanukkah, Tony knew that. He grew up in New York for crying out loud, in some areas Jewish people outnumbered everyone else.

"It is not a major holiday in Israel," she explained. "It is not like Passover or Rosh Hashanah. We still go to work like normal though we still celebrate by 'lighting up' and sharing sufganiyot."

"The donuts," Tony said with a smile, mouth-watering at the thought. Then he frowned, he only knew what Passover was. He'd never heard of 'Rosh Hashanah', something _else_ to investigate, especially if it was so important to his partner.

"I will make some for Hanukkah," Ziva promised.

"Really?" Tony couldn't help but give her an eager look. He hadn't had a good one of those in _years_.

"When it is actually Hanukkah," she promised and then added, "Which is in another week."

Tony deflated at the thought of a wait but that was really a secondary problem at the moment. He had to try and persuade her that there was nothing that needed figuring out about these gifts.

"So, no gifts at Hanukkah?" He checked.

"It is not a replacement for Christmas as you Americans seem to think it is," Ziva complained. "Children might get small gifts and chocolate get but nothing like Christmas gifts."

Hmm, that was good information to know. It was a bit weird how America seemed to change some things to suit its culture. Capitalism at its finest.

"Maybe they don't know when Hanukah is?" he tried.

She didn't buy it. "It is easy to look up."

Dammit. He didn't want to keep going on about it, that would definitely raise her suspicions or cause her to lock down about it so Tony just shrugged. Hopefully, he didn't look like he was too interested.

"I will find them," Ziva announced with confidence.

Tony wasn't sure whether she was telling him or herself that. Either way, her gaze swept along the bull pen before nodding and striding off very purposely.

He debated on whether to follow her, she might unwittingly cause harm, physical or emotional, with her self-imposed quest of figuring this out. No, that was not a good idea. He'd already pestered her enough over this. He didn't want her to get suspicious. Anyway, he still had a lot more little surprises to plan.

Tony didn't know _why_ he was doing this for his partner. Like she said, she didn't celebrate Christmas and the dates didn't match up with Hanukkah so he couldn't use either of those as an excuse. Technically, they matched the advent season (he was planning to go up to as close to Christmas Eve as he could) but there was that whole Jewish thing of hers. He couldn't help but snort at that thought. Definitely not the most appropriate way to put that but it was the reason why he couldn't use the advent excuse.

He just saw things that he thought Ziva would like and got them. Kind of like an impulse that he really had no control over, except he did because it had to be something she liked. It was really nice seeing the soft look on her face over the smallest of things. Big gestures weren't needed at all and would have been more awkward to explain and hide. He didn't want to analyse his thought process and actions about this whole thing too closely. He didn't fully understand it himself and Tony was perfectly happy with leaving it at that.

That and it was such a good feeling getting one over on her. How many people could claim that? Not many still alive. He just didn't think he'd live long enough to brag about it. Had anyone seen the look on her face as she tried to figure out who he was? It got more threatening by the day. It would be quite funny if he didn't know that the end result of her finding him would only be painful.


	3. Reveal

Ziva frowned as her partner walked away, thinking. Something was definitely _off_ with Tony. He had been acting odd for a few days now and she didn't know why. It was driving her insane especially since when pressed he managed to completely deflect her. It was extremely infuriating and she swore that he would pay for it at some point.

She popped a handful of almonds into her mouth and chewed furiously. Yet another thing that was annoying her, these anonymous gifts of which these nuts were another of. She still hadn't figured out who this mysterious gifter was. What sort of investigator was she? Apparently, not a good one. She did not like not being good at something that she needed to be able to do. Especially since they seemed to know exactly where to put the gifts without her seeing them.

"Munch."

These nuts were extremely delicious though. There was no doubt about that. See? Infuriating. Surely people sending gifts would like to be thanked? Ziva felt uncomfortable not thanking the person leaving such sweet treats for her, it just seemed wrong and incredibly impolite. Tony had said that the gifts were so small that the person didn't necessarily think they needed thanks or they would have left a name. It still felt wrong.

She also simply disliked not knowing things. What if this strange mystery person was trying to lead her into a false sense of security and then do something to her? She had voiced that thought to Tony ad well but had only got an eye roll and a muttered comment about 'paranoid ninjas' in response. She huffed. Did Tony not know about the possibilities of being poisoned or led into a trap? These were all valid reasons for trying to find this person!

"Munch."

Right after she finished these delicious nuts.

* * *

Tony couldn't believe that he'd gotten away with this for so long. He had to be up for some sort of award or something, pulling the wool over Ziva's eyes like this. No one could have done it before if her level of frustration was anything to go by. Of course, he'd roped in the whole team to help him (even Gibbs!). They kept an eye on her whereabouts and even distracted her when necessary. He had to say, Tony was incredibly impressed with Probie. The guy didn't even stutter when asking Ziva something about her computer so Tony could sidle down to her car to leave her the smoothie gift vouchers. He owed everyone big time. Though maybe he wouldn't mention the fact that Abby hacked into their internal security cameras to do her bit. That had involved an amusing series of texts for him to keep one step ahead of his partner. It was like playing real life pacman, only with just one terrifying, terrifying ninja ghost.

There were just a few more gifts he wanted to give her. Then they'd all be off for Christmas and wouldn't be able to do it anymore. He'd like to do it for the whole Advent period now that he'd got the idea into his head but unless he wanted to break into her apartment to do so he'd just have to stop at the end of this week. He was running out of ideas for little gifts anyway. This was honestly the most fun he'd had around Christmas for a while; he made his partner smile while simultaneously winding her up and he'd kept nearly each gift under five bucks. Win, win all around in his opinion. In fact, most were under the two-dollar mark, not including the voucher for the smoothie place because he knew how much she loved the Mango Berry Madness ones and just giving her one seemed a bit ridiculous to him.

Just a few more gifts and it would all be over. Tony didn't know whether he wanted to give himself up or not. On one hand, he would get the opportunity to be smug about tricking her, on the other hand there may or may not be pain involved for tricking her. Meh, he'd cross that bridge when he came to it. And maybe burn it behind him to prevent retaliation. All his mind power had to be focused on being very clever about where he was going to hide the remaining gifts. He couldn't leave them in the same place twice, that was an amateur move. And pretty much guaranteed to get him caught. Case in point, those cameras of McGee's.

He passed the gift between his hands and thought. He hadn't exactly left himself many spots. Now, where could this one go? Hmm. Tony couldn't resist, he carefully put the gift down and clapped his hands in glee. Oh, this was so much fun! Someone coughed behind him. He jumped and swung around.

"You okay, DiNozzo?"

Oh, he put his hand on his chest and breathed deeply. It was just Agent Roberts from Cyber Crimes.

"DiNozzo?"

"Uh, yeah. Everything is A-Okay!" Tony replied cheerfully, shooting him his signature DiNozzo grin.

The man didn't look too convinced if the look he shot Tony was anything to go by. Well, at least he didn't hang around. This was wasting precious time. What did he need to do again?

His eyes landed on the wrapped gift on his desk. Oh yeah. Hiding spots! Right, serious face now. He had a job to do.

* * *

"It is you!"

He had to have jumped at least ten feet in the air. What did Ziva do to her shoes to make no noise? Boots should make noise, right?

"Err..."

That was all he could get out as his heart was thumping and Ziva staring incredulously at him like that. He couldn't even feel gleeful at her expression due to the blood pounding in his ears. Not that Ziva seemed to care as she continued talking.

"You are behind all of this!" she exclaimed.

Wow, that was loud.

"Um, Zi?"

"How? Why?"

Just great. She wasn't even talking in complete sentences any more.

"Zi-?"

"Do you _know_ how paranoid I've been? I-"

"Ziva!"

She fell silent and looked at him expectantly.

"Can," he coughed. "Uh, can you let me down?"

He wiggled his feet from the position she had him pressed against the wall in. Ziva blinked at him.

"Oh. Yes." and she released her grip.

Tony feel to the ground with a thump. Ouch. His relief was brief as Ziva loomed over him, hands on her hips and so many questions in her eyes. She reached for the scruff of his neck.

"Eurk!"

"Explain. _Now_."

Tony gulped as their faces came within inches of touching. He never realised how many shades of brown were in Ziva's eyes...

"_Tony_."

**AN: And I think I'll leave what Ziva does to him up to your imaginations. Thanks for reading and reviewing everyone, always appreciated. If you want any other full stories from 'The Meaning of Christmas' just drop me a PM and I'll see what I can come up with!**


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